= Сообщение: 3128 из 12518 ====================================== ENET.SYSOP = От : Robert Bashe 2:2448/44 02 Dec 15 14:48:00 Кому : Ward Dossche 02 Dec 15 14:48:00 Тема : Service announcement FGHI : area://ENET.SYSOP?msgid=2:2448/44+565ef719 На : area://ENET.SYSOP?msgid=2:292/854+a4048635 = Кодировка сообщения определена как: CP866 ================================== ============================================================================== Ward Dossche wrote to Robert Bashe on Wednesday December 02 2015 at 13:31:
RB>> Not surprising, in view of the fact that you never went to an RB>> American school. Nor do I speak of the present situation, but that RB>> when I went to school.
WD> Several of my friends and some relatives went to the US for a year to WD> enroll in a US highschool for the senior year.
I assume you ignored my comment "Nor do I speak of the present situation, but that when I went to school." I took two years of Latin because I preferred that to French, which was also offered. At the time, I spoke Spanish fairly well, and thus was not interested in the Spanish courses.
Unfortunately, there were no German courses when I went to highschool, doubtless a result of the world wars. I learned German from books in college, and had two years of German (and 2 years of French) in college. My German professor was extremely good, so that's part of why I'm here now. My French is regrettably still very bad.
RB>> The Latin and Greek emphasis in European schools was never a big hit RB>> in the States. Technology and science was and is. That's why most new RB>> developments in technical areas are in places like Silicon Valley and RB>> not in Brussels or even anywhere in Germany.
WD> As much as I enjoyed the classic education, more technology would have WD> been welcome though we are talking like 40-45 years ago ... no PCs, no WD> smartphone ... it was a different world.
I have to agree there. The Latin and Greek educations in Europe were more typical of the Victorian era than those after the scientific and medical advances at the end of the century.
WD> BTW, most of the innovative work in Silicon Valley was performed by WD> non-Americans.
Who escaped from "European civilization" in the 1930s-1940s. A fair number were jews. People like Fermi and Einstein. Or to jump to the present, a certain "Mark Zuckerberg", who - with a name like that, would not have lasted long in the so-called "third Reich". Not to forget Andy Grove (the American name), a Hungarian jewish co-founder of Intel who was shrewd enough to escape from a death camp. One of his favorate sayings was "Only the paranoid survive", and he had every reason to voice that.
RB>> The Belgians seem to believe that they became independent in 1830. RB>> Used to be part of the Netherlands. That's why so many Belgians still RB>> speak Flemish.
WD> Tearing-away from the Netherlands was a stupidity. It never should WD> have happened.
Good question. There seem to be a lot of French-speaking Belgians nowadays, as well as those in the Flermish areas, but the economic situations have apparently reversed since the 1950s or so. The French areas were poor and downtrodden then, now the Flemish areas have economic problems - at least that's what I read.
And of course the German areas have no real say at all, although German is an official third language in Belgium.
The whole situation reminds me now, and reminded me in the 1980s, of that in Quebec in Canada. Those who feel downtrodden and/or economically threatened automatically react rather violently, in a probably fruitless desire to protect themselves. That was and remains the case in Quebec. The situation in Belgium still appears to be similar.
